Making your Mark: digital inscription, animation, and a new visual semiotic

This article will consider the making of animated film by Year 6 pupils (11 years old) based on the story of Little Red Riding Hood, using digital drawing and animation software. It will examine how the act of inscription - making signs on a page or screen using software, pens or other materials—might be different in the context of digital composition of the moving image, and how, at the present time, digital modes of inscription may offer a greater freedom of expression to users, especially in education. The authors locate their theory of digital inscription within a proposal, briefly summarised in the article, of a wider model of a social semiotic grammar of the moving image.